head to head · open source
Strapi vs Ghost
Strapi has 73,425 GitHub stars, 10,050 forks, 558 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Ghost has 55,658 stars, 12,130 forks, 182 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Strapi leads on adoption by 32% (73,425 vs 55,658 stars). Strapi is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence; Ghost is written in TypeScript under MIT. Strapi has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, Ghost 22%. Ghost was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (cms, javascript), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Strapi | Ghost | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 73K | ★ 56K |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 12K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Strapi if
- You weight community size — 73K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Ghost if
- You want the Ghost feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Ghost fits your workflow better
About Strapi
Open source headless CMS, self hosted or Cloud you're in control. The leading open source headless CMS, 100% JavaScript/TypeScript, flexible and fully customizable. Docs · Strapi Cloud · Roadmap · Discord · Discussions Strapi is an open source, self hosted headless CMS that lets developers build content APIs fast while giving content creators a friendly editing interface. Define your content models and Strapi generates a full API, ready to consume from any frontend, mobile app, or IoT device. Design content structures visually with the Content Type Builder , no code required Auto generated REST & GraphQL APIs…
read the full Strapi overview →
About Ghost
Ghost.org • Forum • Docs • Contributing • Twitter [!NOTE] Love open source? We're hiring! Ghost is looking staff engineers to join the team and work with us full time The easiest way to get a production instance deployed is with our official Ghost(Pro) managed service. It takes about 2 minutes to launch a new site with worldwide CDN, backups, security and maintenance all done for you. For most people this ends up being the best value option because of how much time it saves — and 100% of revenue goes to the Ghost Foundation; funding the maintenance and further development of the project itself. So you’ll be…
read the full Ghost overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Strapi or Ghost more popular?
Strapi has 73,425 GitHub stars and Ghost has 55,658. Strapi has the larger community by that measure.
Are Strapi and Ghost free?
Both are open source. Strapi has no licence declared in this registry, and Ghost is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Strapi and Ghost?
Strapi is written in TypeScript and Ghost in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Strapi or Ghost?
Choose Strapi if you want the larger community (73,425 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose Ghost if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.